Vieux Lyon was almost a freeway

 

I was in yet another cathedral here in Lyon called Cathedrale Saint-Jean Baptiste. Catholic, but not as fancy as others. The architecture is Romanesque. Building started in 1100's and finished in late 1400's.

Romanesque traits are massive stone and brickwork, tall round arches, small windows, usually housing sculpture depicting. Biblical scenes. This has all of those features. 

While I was there, they were tuning the organ. It was installed in 1841 and added on to in 1875. It made quite the sound in the massive cathedral.

The cathedral has an interesting feature- the Lyon astronomical  clock.. It has an astrolabe in it which is a handheld model of the universe. It was used to identify precise locations of planets and measure latitudes and other stuff I don't understand.

It has several dials. One shows the sun and moon revolving around the earth (like they used to believe) on the horizon of Lyon. Another dial shows minutes numbered one to sixty.

Another part shows a calendar that works for 66 years. So it was set 66 years ago, but stoped in 2017 two years short. There are plans to reset it.

On the top is a automoton that has various figures among them Jesus and Mary that rise according to the day of the week. So  Chist rising on Sunday, Death on Monday(because they've known for centuries that Mondays suck), Saint John the Baptist on Tuesday, Saint Stephen on Wednesday, Christ with a chalice on Thursday, a child with a cross on Friday, Mary on Saturday. (per Wikipedia)

This Cathedral is in the Vieux Lyon, the Renaissance area. An interesting thing about the area: in the 1960's the mayor wanted to tear it  all down and put in an expressway because the area was unloveable. Protests stopped that and renovations began. It is now a UNESCO World Heritage Site.  

We had to leave our air bnb.

M on glass walkway

 This has not been the best of weeks. 

We arrived at creepy 17th century apartment on Saturday. It was like air bnb from hell. The four keys to get in plus code for the elevator started it off.

Now I can appreciate an older building as much as the next person but going inside and living in a 300+ old building is another story. It definitely looked it's age.

We start from the massive wooden door with the weird key to get in. As you enter, there is a long cement hall. You come to a staircase. Beside the staircase is a small courtyard that has an old well they used to get their water from. On the other side of the door is a door to the cellar where the ghosts of past residents roam.. 

We were on the 5th floor, so we used the tiny elevator which required a code to go to the floor. When you get to the floor, you step out on to a landing this is in the courtyard five stories up. Couple of steps up and you are in the hallway. First door that requires a key. Go in that door, go a short way down the hall to another door, another key. You havre arrived at your apartment door area and another door, another key. Go to the actual door of the apartment use another to get in. 

You enter into a combination living room, kitchen, dining area. It has the  original stone floor. The walls are old stone. There is a bathroom on this floor with the original old door. 

There is a very narrow iron spiral staircase to the left of the door. Going up is manageable. Coming down is dangerous. At the top is a bedroom with a closet and a bed up on a platform with stairs at the end. There is a sliding door that leads to a glass walkway that leads to another bed in a nook with slanted ceiling. You can see through to the 1st floor as you walk across the walkway.

I decided against sleeping on the 2nd floor due to the stairway. I'm 67 and it really was kind of dangerous. So I slept on the couch. 

The first night we noticed fruit flies. We thought, no big deal, They will go away. Nope . It was bad. They didn't go away. They were more and more of a nuisance. We tried the vinegar trick. Nope. Didn't work. So we decided we had had enough and moved out. The place had other problems. We are in a hotel til our next airbnb date.

Not a good week.

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September 21, 2022 at 06:50PM
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September 21, 2022 at 06:50PM

France is everything you thought it would be

 It feels like there is such a contrast between France and Switzerland , Germany and Austria. This is my personal perception of course. The later three felt conservative.  Switzerland seemed perfect but it wasn't.  The German and Austrian  people seemed stoic, family oriented, traditional.

France honestly feels likea wild card. The first day here we could see this was going to be different. Very diverse. People obviously feel they can be whoever they want here.  There is a big alternative culture.

What struck me the most is how everybody here looks like a million bucks. At least they did on a Saturday night.  The young people had on the latest sportswear, hip trends, soccer jerseys. Women here know how to look chic with little effort.  The men look cool. 

You may say - oh get over it, there are fashionable people everywhere...but I'm telling you that what you hear about the French sense of fashion is true. 

It is already fun here. There were some street performers  imitating Michael Jackson's dancing. Not the first time we've seen that on this trip. One of the guys was really good.  No Elvis impersonators yet. We saw five young  women filming a video in a public square.  Their dancing was very good. A teenager was kicking a soccer ball down the street and he'd kick it to random strangers, some of whom played with him for a couple of minutes. Skateboarders in a plaza, trying to do a hard trick, surrounded by people of all ages cheering them on.

In the middle of all this are beautiful French apartments with ornate wrought iron balconies, centuries old buildings, fountains. There are restaurants and bakeries with real croissants. And to think we've only been here two days. 

N 

S

Austria was 

Will we continue this trip for a year?

Will we continue this trip for a year?

 I have to say there have been days of doubt and homesickness on this this trip on the regular. 

For me it's moving place to place in airbnbs and hotels. You never know what your gonna get in these places. Your standards might not be theirs. It's hard living in a place that isn't yours with your stuff. You don't realize how important your home is til you don't have it. It's a place of comfort and security. 

Going to new places, you hope the neighborhood is decent and safe. We really haven't  had a problem with that so far. Where is the grocery store? Figuring out the transportation system.  How much is it? Where is it? How do we use it? 

In the airbnb how do you operate the stove, dishwasher, washing machine. Instruction manuals online are a beautiful thing. 

For M it's all of the above and having to ride the trains from one country or town to another. Sometimes even trying to figure out how to buy tickets is hard. Often if you are going any distance you are riding two or three different train systems.  There are times you transfer 2 or 3 times.  It's exhausting. The scenery makes up for it though like the route from Geneva to Lyon along the river through the hills was beautiful. 

Lastly, this is expensive. Going to major cities is expensive. Even in an airbnb. We had planned to go Berlin in September but it was just too expensive. So we decided to break up September into Vienna, Augsburg, Germany and Lausanne Switzerland and Lyon. We really hadn't had plans to go to Austria or Switzerland but it was probably one of the best parts of the trip. 

Vienna was stunning and I want to go back there. Augsburg was fun because of the Plarrer. Switzerland was probably one of the beautiful places in the world. 

Paris is another very expensive place even on the outskirts so we have put it off so the prices will be lower. We are in Lyon for 2 weeks because we needed to stop the one week here and there thing. Then the plan is to to Spain for most of October and Paris in November. 

Will we continue this for one year? Don't know at this point. If we were to quit after six months, it would be disappointing but not the end of the world. We have done a really cool thing either way. Only time, 

and how we feel, will determine it.

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September 18, 2022 at 06:59PM

We're living in a dungeon in Lyon France

We're living in a dungeon in Lyon France

 So we are now in Lyon, France. Our airbnb is in a 17th century building. I really didn't realize it would be like this when I booked it. 

When we came, the entrance there was this massive door. The guy who owns it let us in and showed the way to the apartment. We went past some courtyard where people used to got their water from a well. There was an area that led to a cellar. We went up an an elevator down a hall to another door and finally to the apartment. It has a stone floor and all these beams of wood. 

There is a a narrow spiral staircase that leads up to the bedrooms. One bed is a loft with a window with a beautiful view of the river. The other bedroom is across this glass walkway that looks below to the first floor. 

After the guy left, we sat there kind of stunned, looking around. Not what we expected. There are skylights. The windows in the living room look into the sort of courtyard that looks

Coming in the door feels like coming into a dungeon. You have to actually use four keys and a code to get to your floor on the elevator.  It's like you are entering the CIA headquarters.

To think people lived here 300 years ago. I'm sure their ghosts haunt the halls.

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September 17, 2022 at 08:26PM

Switzerland and the Truman show have a lot in common

 Switzerland is a fascinating country. It is almost too good to be true. It's kind of reminds me of the Truman show where everything  seems perfect but you wonder what in the hell is going on behind the scenes?!!  Har. 

People here are happy, have good salaries, good healthcare, excellent infrastructure. It's a beautiful country. Its diverse. They won't get involved in anybody else's war. It's too bad they're stark raving mad!! (Just kidding)

So here are some fun facts about Switzerland:

1) I don't know about other cities in the country, but Lausanne has few traffic lights and no stop signs. When drivers see pedestrians, they stop and let them cross. I may move here just for that.

2) It's not unusual to see soldiers on trains with their assault rifles. I sat next to one today. Men have to do either military or civilian service. They go through basic training for about six months and then have annual training every year for 10 years. If you choose not to comply, they take 3% of your salary til age 37.

3) A Five Guys cheeseburger is $15.

4) Sundays are sacred. You are to do nothing to disturb your neighbor: mowing the lawn, washing clothes, hanging laundry, parties, etc. it is a day of quiet to spend with family and friends. Nothing is open.

5) Switzerland has a low obesity rate. With all these steep streets, I can see why.

6) Woefully behind on womens rights. Women did not get the right to vote until1971!!  One small district didn't pass the right to vote until 1991. YEAH 1991.

7) The Landsgemeinde.  Switzerland has 26 cantons(districts or states). Historically, four times a year, people would gather in large groups in 8 of the cantons. Anyone could propose a new law or amend an old one. It was majority rule, by show of hands. This still happens in a couple of places.

8) Switzerland has shelters for every single person in the country in case of nuclear war. It's the law. Large complexes have to build it into the building. The biggest one is in Lucerne which is built under a motorway and can hold 20,000 people. These are kept up and have necessities to live for months.

And there you have it, wonderful and quirky Switzerland!

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September 16, 2022 at 07:43PM

What the heck is the Sch-Sch-Schengen?

 I had never travelled out of the U.S. except  in 1990 on my way to the Middle East. We had stopovers in Frankfurt and London. Never saw anything except the base. So I had no idea how to do any of it. I didn't even have a passport. 

Never had to find out about entering other countries, how long you could stay, etc. Didn't know what to expect at customs. I did a lot of research. Got true and false information. 

As an American, it's fairly easy to enter the UK and Europe. In England you line up, scan your passport and it takes your picture and that's it. Once you are in the UK, you don't have to show your passport again. As of now, passing into Ireland from Northern Ireland, at least, by train,  required no passport. I think they are still negotiating the border situation after Brexit. .

When we entering Europe it changed. We entered the Schengen zone, made up of 26 countries in which you can travel without showing passport for 90 days. (By the way,  Ireland is not in the Schengen and neither is the UK).

Leaving Ireland our passports were checked. When we got to Vienna, checked again and asked where we were going and how long we would be there.

If you overstay in the Schengen even one day, you can be fined, jailed or banned. You can spend 90 days in the Schengen every 6 months.  So we will leave here after 90 days. 

We will have to spend 90 days outside the Schengen. We plan to go to Morocco and Turkey and another couple places yet to be determined.